Hasya Kavi Sammelan

Was looking for some interesting videos to watch on Youtube today, and landed up on a Hasya Kavi Sammelan video conducted in IIT KGP. That got me started into a journey into the past. My father has always been a great fan of Kavi Sammelan’s (literally, a congregation of poets), and as a kid we used to go for many performances during the festival seasons of Holi and Diwali.

Great thing about these are – unlike the idiot boxes of today – the poets would mix humour with social messages, the humour would be very clean and simple, weaved together using perfect verse and recited eloquently. Those days are now over – what we enjoy today is Big Boss, and stand up comedy where in most cases men dress up as women and act stupid (don’t get me wrong — that’s also fun and enjoyable, but these lack the depth).

So, here’s a peep into the past and a few verses I discovered today. I’ll start with Ashok Chakradhar in his brilliant Buddhe Bacche aka Galiyaan: